Outrageous situation at the psychiatric hospital in the town of Ștei, Bihor county! Following a check carried out on the basis of an anonymous tip, the authorities made shocking discoveries. Inspectors from the Council for Monitoring the Implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities discovered moldy and urine-filled mattresses, filth, degraded walls, spoiled food, and bruised patients.
Ștei psychiatric hospital is under the umbrella of the Ministry of Health. Photo source: archive
According to the prepared report, it seems that the patients were assaulted by the hospital employees and even electrocuted with an electroshock device. The inspectors notified the police, the ANPC, the Directorate of Public Health and the Institute of Forensic Medicine. “Adevărul” reporters spoke with the institution’s manager and the hospital’s medical director, who explained the situation in detail.
“It seems that a former patient complained to us. And I guess who it is. We are talking about a person who was hospitalized several times with us, the last time he stayed for about two or three years. I prescribed a treatment which he followed, and when his health condition improved he was discharged. He is a hypervigilant person, who makes complaints very often to all kinds of institutions and bodies, qualified or not, in all fields. He complains about everything,” Dr. Adrian Horga, psychiatrist and medical director of the institution, told “Adevărul”.
Following this complaint, on September 17, the hospital management was visited by three inspectors from the Council for Monitoring the Implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. “They came on the morning of September 17, at 8:00 am. We woke up with them at the gate. They said they came to the control, they want to see the hospital. We have nothing to hide, so we invited them in”also specified the manager of the medical unit, Horia Miara. “They visited the whole hospital but irregularities, as they say, they found but in one ward: Ward 1 Male Psychiatry”continues the director.
“The stun gun was out of order”
The manager admits that he is facing problems in the hospital but, he says, things have been exaggerated. “The electroshock machine discovered by the control team is non-functional and was found in a bedside table, in a lounge where no patients are accommodated. It’s not the hospital machine, I didn’t even know it existed. Later, one of the employees admitted that it belonged to him. Why did you bring it? The device has a flashlight-type device attached, and the man said he would have used that light source in the event of a power outage. But, if you ask me, the story doesn’t really stand up because if the power goes out, we operate with the help of a generator”.
The manager confessed to us that the patients who were hit, who had bruises, cuts, were not electrocuted with this device, as the inspectors would have implied. “Those bruises were not caused by electrocution. Under no circumstances. And those from IML, after analyzing the situation, said the same thing”. Horia Miara comes up with another explanation: the people would have hit themselves. “Let me tell you what happens: the patients are mentally ill hospitalized based on court sentences, article 110, of the Criminal Code. Criminal sentences for acts such as murder, rape and other violence. Most of them suffer from schizophrenia, but there are also other diseases, they are also retarded. And they fit together. They also injure themselves, fall alone, sometimes self-mutilate. All these incidents are recorded in the registers regarding events adverse to the medical act”.
“Patients self-inflicted their injuries”
The same thing was explained to us by the medical director of the institution: “It is about patients with severe behavioral disorders who attack each other. This type of behavior is specific, unfortunately, in salons specially designed for this pathology, namely severe cognitive disability, severe mental retardation. Those lesions were not in any form of electrical brand. There are no injuries caused by electric shocks”.
The medical director also stated that that electroshock device is prohibited in the hospital, and the person who introduced it, if proven guilty, will be held accountable. “You are not allowed to bring it like that in a hospital, especially in a psychiatric one. It is a serious matter the presence of that bason in the hospital, even if it was not used against the patients”. According to the labor code, the sanctions that the employee risks can range from a warning to the termination of the employment contract. “But a warning would be too mild if he is found guilty. For now, the employee continues to work in the hospital,” continued manager Miara. He also told us, however, that the statements of the patients who accused the hospital staff of repeated assaults cannot be taken into account, because these people are sick: “Patients are mentally ill and have all kinds of diagnoses. Not all their statements can be taken into account as truthful”.
“Little brats or brats. Maybe the voice will be raised”
So, we wonder, what was that machine doing in the hospital? “Most likely, that employee, who has been working with us for almost five years, tried to intimidate patients. Many have violent behavior. But even so, even if he didn’t use the cane, intimidation is also prohibited.” says the manager.
When asked if the employees could have physically assaulted the patients, the director replied that he does not think so, but these possible facts are also being investigated. “In this regard, the Disciplinary Investigation Commission received the surveillance images from the video cameras. It remains to be seen whether patients were assaulted by staff or others. I haven’t seen the pictures yet. But in a few days, most likely, we will know exactly what happened there.” continues director Horia Miara. “Maybe it’s about little attitudinal inadvertences that have a violent tone, but not extreme violence. What we’re investigating is whether there’s inappropriate behavior – but I’m not talking about extreme violence – like little hugs, teasing or maybe verbal violence. Raise your voice..things we are already regulating by retraining our staff in this regard”, the medical director also says.
He also stated that the electroshock device is prohibited in the hospital, and the person who introduced it, if proven guilty, will be held accountable. “You’re not allowed to bring something like that into a hospital, especially a psychiatric one. It is a serious matter the presence of that bason in the hospital, even if it was not used against the patients”.
Dirty mattresses, patients with torn clothes. Directors’ explanations
The inspectors who came to check also discovered other irregularities that the hospital management explained to us. It would be, first of all, about dirty, moldy, damaged mattresses. “Their control came at a time when we were sanitizing. Some mattresses were taken out into the hallways to be washed, cleaned. It was also then that the linen was changed. In our hospital, there are people who wear diapers, who frequently get dirty. And then they are very difficult to maintain. But if you take that out of context, yeah, they look sloppy. But I’m not. It’s just an exaggeration.” stated Dr. Adrian Horga.
As for the communal bathrooms, without separators, where the sick wash in a pile, the manager admitted that, indeed, it is so. “We have separate bathrooms for women and men. But yes, in men there is this problem of separators that do not exist. The building is very old, it was built in 1966. The sanitary facilities have been renovated. But the number of showers and toilets must be related to the number of beds. In order to correspond, because the space does not allow us, we placed the showers in a distinct area, without separators between them”.
Horia Miara wanted to specify that frequent modernizations are being made in the hospital. “We modernized the bathrooms, changed the showers, the sinks, the faucets, the floor. We whitewashed the whole hospital last year”.
The story of little alters and torn clothes
From the non-compliant bathrooms and showers, the inspectors reached the kitchen, where they discovered expired food. “They found a casserole of small, frozen, expired meat. But those little ones weren’t for patients, they were for staff use. It was the employees’ food left in the fridge. There’s an oven over there in the kitchen, and the ladies would probably be next to cook something. Or they wanted to and didn’t have time.. they would have forgotten the casserole there. Then, two or three more cream pots were discovered, also expired. All employee food. Plus some unlabeled bread. But far from ever giving adulterated food to the sick,” the hospital management appears.
And from the kitchen, control moved to the living rooms. Here the patients, many of them, were found with torn and dirty clothes. “They have equipment that we, the hospital, make available. Sweatpants, T-shirts, blouses. Clothes are washed periodically. The problem is that many of the patients tear their clothes, others, if they are not smart, take their clothes off. For example, right during the control, I changed the clothes of the patients of the respective department, and shortly after, one of them had already torn them.” the manager confessed. As for the personal hygiene items, the patients still use those received from the hospital. “They have towels, soaps, shampoo. But we can’t leave them at their fingertips, because we want to avoid incidents. Some may drink the shampoo or eat the toothpaste and other problems arise.”
Reasons and solutions
Why did it end up in such a situation? Due to the lack of staff, says the hospital management. “We would need more employees to supervise the sick more closely. But I have to have something to pay these people with. To give you an idea: currently, on a ward of about 100 patients, I have about 10 nurses who work in shifts and about 6 supervisors, who also work in shifts. Then, during the year employees take vacations. Due to the specifics of the hospital, the number of vacation days is higher. A person who has a long working experience may also have 35-40 working days of vacation in a year. That means they work 10 months out of 12. And then, all these things influence the work schedule,” the hospital manager explains the situation.
Horia Miara stated that it will hire in the next period. “During this period there is an ordinance that blocks employment. We will request the unblocking of the positions. We will also rotate the medical staff within the hospital. We have also changed the staff of the department where there were problems and we will bring in staff to make things better. We did a staff-wide training course on ethics and integrity. And last week I did a training with the supervisory staff, with the nurses and the supervisors, regarding the rights of the patients, the acts that are prohibited, the bad treatments and all the aspects related to this situation”.
The medical director Adrian Horga also told us that the psychiatric hospital in Ștei is recognized locally, nationally and internationally for good practices in psychiatric medicine. “We have never had any complaints from any patient or relative.”
